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LordofBones
Master of Realmslore

1477 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  10:53:27  Show Profile Send LordofBones a Private Message
At this point, I'm starting to think that the Chosen are being shoehorned in too much. You can't trip over a rock without a Chosen popping up.

I mean, I can understand Fzoul and Mystra's Power Rangers, but why does the god of writing need a Chosen? Why the specific need to have the Rotting Man be a Chosen of Talona?
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TBeholder
Great Reader

2376 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  14:23:47  Show Profile Send TBeholder a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Lyiat

The statement is more that 5e broke him as a Ranger rather than Drizzt being a bad one. WotC redefined what a ranger is intended to be so that Drizzt doesn't particularly fit that description anymore.

Aye. Though this still isn't quite as bad as when in 2e they redefined what a ranger is intended to be so that Drizzt does particularly fit that description.

People never wonder How the world goes round -Helloween
And even I make no pretense Of having more than common sense -R.W.Wood
It's not good, Eric. It's a gazebo. -Ed Whitchurch
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Rymac
Learned Scribe

USA
315 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  17:59:09  Show Profile  Visit Rymac's Homepage Send Rymac a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by TBeholder

quote:
Originally posted by Lyiat

The statement is more that 5e broke him as a Ranger rather than Drizzt being a bad one. WotC redefined what a ranger is intended to be so that Drizzt doesn't particularly fit that description anymore.

Aye. Though this still isn't quite as bad as when in 2e they redefined what a ranger is intended to be so that Drizzt does particularly fit that description.



I particularly liked 3 and 3.5 edition of the Ranger, as you could get more species enemies as the Ranger advanced in level. I carried this concept backwards from 3 and 3.5 to 2nd edition, because the change the Ranger more classic.

The case of the broken Drizzt has as much to do with the Dungeons and Dragons cartoon's Ranger character Hank, and Aragorn's "Ranger of the North" from Lord of the Rings. The Ranger concept existed long before Drizzt. The tweaks to the class began in Unearthed Arcana.

To me, it was obvious from novels that Drizzt was a multiclassed character, more Fighter than Ranger to account for the specialization, with a third class (Barbarian or Thief) thrown in as well.
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Tanthalas
Senior Scribe

Portugal
508 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  19:01:58  Show Profile Send Tanthalas a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by BEAST
If orcs are as evil as I think they are, then I really don't have much issue with her or anyone else killing their babies. Infant-like proportions don't undo their fate/destiny/nature as evil killing machines. I don't flinch at killing spiders or snakes, either--especially if their folks kill my family and friends, and then encroach onto my territory and creep through my front door. If I then find some of their babies on my territory or inside my front door, too, you won't find me going all mushy and weak in the knees. They're still predatory vermin. A wolf in sheep's clothing is still a wolf. And a predator with doe eyes and baby-sized proportions is still a predator.



The problem with this line of thinking is that Orcs are intelligent beings, they are not mere animals without rational thought. So no, they are not comparable to snakes and spiders. Or rather, they weren't until Mielikki dictated that they were nothing but animals.

This is my complaint about this decision on WotC's part (or whoever was responsible). I don't want or need good orcs everywhere, but I do want to have the possibility of seeing peaceful orcs somewhere in the Realms. And having intelligent beings being irredeemably evil just isn't believable to me. It takes away all choice.

Knowing how a villain became a villain is one of the things that can make them interesting. Would Artemis be as interesting as he is if instead of knowing his past we got "He's evil because he was born that way" like we're getting with Orcs? Would he be as interesting as he is if we didn't have that possibility of him being redeemed?

Sir Markham pointed out, drinking another brandy. "A chap who can point at you and say 'die' has the distinct advantage".
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hashimashadoo
Master of Realmslore

United Kingdom
1150 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  19:12:53  Show Profile  Visit hashimashadoo's Homepage Send hashimashadoo a Private Message
I would think that Eldath, who Mielikki apparently sees as a sister, would object to this line of thought since the Ondonti orcs were once exclusively worshipers of Eldath.

When life turns it's back on you...sneak attack for extra damage.

Head admin of the FR wiki:

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Eilserus
Master of Realmslore

USA
1446 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  19:35:37  Show Profile Send Eilserus a Private Message
I've always viewed orcs and other goblinkin as monsters created by the dark gods, or Gruumsh if we're talking about orcs. Because they were created by his blood, they are all evil, period.

Real world psychology (nurture the baby orc to grow up good etc.) doesn't work on monsters that were created by evil gods. Evil does not beget good, it's just not possible. However, half-orcs I could see as more open to a neutral bent (with a rare goody or two) due to human blood in them.

Of course, this is just me in my views. Whatever a person wants in their Realms is the right answer for them.
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BEAST
Master of Realmslore

USA
1714 Posts

Posted - 21 Oct 2014 :  23:03:03  Show Profile  Visit BEAST's Homepage Send BEAST a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Tanthalas

The problem with this line of thinking is that Orcs are intelligent beings, they are not mere animals without rational thought. So no, they are not comparable to snakes and spiders. Or rather, they weren't until Mielikki dictated that they were nothing but animals.

Intelligence does not equal goodly morality or ethics, though. Just because they can weigh out various options and make a selection does not mean that they consider moral aspects thereof.

Consider this chart of <which brain functions correspond to which regions of the human brain>. Morality corresponds to the frontal lobe (and even more specifically, the left frontal lobe). Now if orcs have blunted, flattened frontal lobes, perhaps that would mean that their brains are shrunken and underdeveloped in this region, which could compromise their ethical reasoning. They could have fine development in other regions of the brain, but their morals would still lag far behind.

And if their entire brain was significantly smaller in comparison to humans, while their brain stems were still quite proportionally large, then this would make them a whole lot like reptiles: strong on instinct, and extremely weak on higher thinking abilities.

I don't know that Mielikki dictated that they were any particular such way, so much as restating what the lore has already been telling us for decades.

quote:
This is my complaint about this decision on WotC's part (or whoever was responsible).

What about Gygax and TSR, though? Why pin this all on WOTC, 5E, or Mielikki?

quote:
I don't want or need good orcs everywhere, but I do want to have the possibility of seeing peaceful orcs somewhere in the Realms.

You could still have it, in the form of exceptional, mutant orcs. Call them special snowflake orcs, if you want.

quote:
And having intelligent beings being irredeemably evil just isn't believable to me. It takes away all choice.

That assumes that they ever had such choice in the first place. And that assumption doesn't seem to fit with the established lore on orcs.

quote:
Knowing how a villain became a villain is one of the things that can make them interesting. Would Artemis be as interesting as he is if instead of knowing his past we got "He's evil because he was born that way" like we're getting with Orcs? Would he be as interesting as he is if we didn't have that possibility of him being redeemed?

Yes, he would be interesting, as a humanoid monster, like a psychopath. I hear many of them are born that way, and they are scary!

But no, he would not be as interesting to me as someone who gave the glimmer of hope for redemption. Part of the reason I read fantasy is for an escape from the darkness of the Real World, and I need me some light.

I just don't need it from my orcs.

"'You don't know my history,' he said dryly."
--Drizzt Do'Urden (The Pirate King, Part 1: Chapter 2)

<"Comprehensive Chronology of R.A. Salvatore Forgotten Realms Works">
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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
3802 Posts

Posted - 22 Oct 2014 :  00:11:47  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by BEAST

quote:
Originally posted by Tanthalas

The problem with this line of thinking is that Orcs are intelligent beings, they are not mere animals without rational thought. So no, they are not comparable to snakes and spiders. Or rather, they weren't until Mielikki dictated that they were nothing but animals.

Intelligence does not equal goodly morality or ethics, though. Just because they can weigh out various options and make a selection does not mean that they consider moral aspects thereof.

Consider this chart of <which brain functions correspond to which regions of the human brain>. Morality corresponds to the frontal lobe (and even more specifically, the left frontal lobe). Now if orcs have blunted, flattened frontal lobes, perhaps that would mean that their brains are shrunken and underdeveloped in this region, which could compromise their ethical reasoning. They could have fine development in other regions of the brain, but their morals would still lag far behind.

And if their entire brain was significantly smaller in comparison to humans, while their brain stems were still quite proportionally large, then this would make them a whole lot like reptiles: strong on instinct, and extremely weak on higher thinking abilities.

I don't know that Mielikki dictated that they were any particular such way, so much as restating what the lore has already been telling us for decades.



Human-like intelligence implies choice. Not obligatory the choice of good, but the possibility of it, and the -even greater- possibility for beings to choose to not act like crazed berserkers and -for example- mind their own business.

The reason for the evilness of greenskins is magic (their souls were created with ''the evulz'' inside them by Gruumsh, or this is what the PHB has on it), not the brain, tho -AFAIK, that is-. Also you are assuming that their brain has the same configuration the human one (which in itself is a topic still subject to various experiments and speculations AFAIK). This is fiction and we don't have data to comment on it (especially in a setting where our laws of chemistry and physics don't work and are replaced by something else -- tech doesn't work in FR, and it implies that the laws that have been taken in account to make it work are different in the Realms).

The main point however is that a being who can reason but cannot choose is the same as a robot with a very articulated program. It's just uninteresting, it exists as cannon fodder for the heroes to slay. For a little time it seemed that the orcs were being steered away from being merely that, and I -personally- took it as an improvement. Now that they're back to the beginning, I think that it is an arbitrary removal of something that made them more interesting, while still retaining their nature of mostly aggressive and barbaric villains.

quote:


What about Gygax and TSR, though? Why pin this all on WOTC, 5E, or Mielikki?


The thing is that -as far as I can tell- fantasy has evolved beyond black/white stuff into something more nuanced and ''realistic'' (in the sense that it aids suspension of disbelief and immersion). We're not in the 1980s anymore. Also WotC tried to do something different with the orcs of Many Arrows before -and IMO it was one of the few changes that actually added something to the Realms while not feeling alien to them, instead of removing stuff- only to backpedal on it. Now that's not the same as having ''goodly'' orc (and Idk why people are so fixated with the idea that if someone from races like orcs or drow is not evil, they must be good) but, you know, non good creatures who decide to mind their business aren't exactly worthy of being exterminated without thought either, or of being labelled as unredeemably evil and so on. The fact that there was tension between orcs and the North doesn't imply (and it's higly unlikely) that it was a Hive-Mind decision (especially considering that a treaty was signed and that therefore some among the orcs chose to try and live differently). Maybe some raiders sparked the flame of the conflict in an already uneasy truce. In war generally there isn't a truly right and wrong party, because its effects weigh the most on the shoulders of people who didn't want it or didn't have the decisional power to oppose it. I think that, after seeing a different, more ''neutral'' and reasonable side of the orcs, it makes sense to assume that people who don't want this war exist among them.

The orcs -however- have been in peace with the North since 1372 DR, up to early 1400s (for like 40 years), till the situation changed and for whatever reasons (Idk them, I'd like to hear them, if they are reported anywhere) the hostilities started again. This implies that they can indeed choose to not be random savages and that there is some incongruence among orc-lore from various eras on this matter.

Also, note that this isn't blaming, it would make no sense, it is just some criticism.

quote:

You could still have it, in the form of exceptional, mutant orcs. Call them special snowflake orcs, if you want.


I remember you said something similar in another topic. IMO attributing choices to genes is even worse than doing so with magic, because it is something that can be applied to anything.

quote:
quote:
If lions, and tigers, and bears (oh, my!) are naturally predisposed to being dangerous creatures, but natural exceptions exist; then maybe the exceptions amongst the drow or goblinoids are likewise natural exceptions. The occasional good-natured circus tiger or neverendingly lovable Pit Bull might owe its beneficence to a genetic mutation. Maybe Drizzt's goodliness is the result of a birth "defect", too!

Therefore, perhaps the notion of choice by such individuals is only an illusion. Maybe they were naturally empowered to live different lifestyles from most other members of their respective species.

And maybe this goodly genetic mutation could be passed on to future generations, through successive in-breeding. In this way, the previous evil nature of the entire species could possibly be supplanted by a newer goodly nature.





That argument can easily go through a slippery slope, and can be applied to humans themselves.

At the end of the day, living creatures are just (very complex) physical systems. You give them an input (which can be putting them in a particular situation, or simply speaking to them, 'showing' them something -how you do it depends on what senses the being has got-), it causes reactions inside them and gives back ONE output (AFAIK, even in Quantum Mechanics, systems have a deterministic evoultion with time, given the intial conditions, which -in our case- would be how the being is born and its genes). The implication of this is that, being just a mass of molecules working according to the result of chemical reactions, no living thing -not even the intelligent one- has choice, because its reaction are determined only by what it is (genes) and external inputs.

Also, if things were actually that way, you could say that 'evil' people are not evil, they didn't choose, they were simply born that way. They are ''victims'' of their nature in a way, which makes them even hard to hate, from a certain standpoint.

Now no one that I'm aware of knows if this is true, or not (and it would suck if it was), but point is that attributing choices to genes strips any living being from the capacity to actually make them (so it doesn't add layers of complexity, it removes them).





Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 22 Oct 2014 01:01:25
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Tanthalas
Senior Scribe

Portugal
508 Posts

Posted - 22 Oct 2014 :  00:31:45  Show Profile Send Tanthalas a Private Message
I'm not even going to bother with your attempt to try and use real world human brain physiology to justify a lack of morality in orcs. Irennan already did that. Hell, he's pretty much saying what I'd like to say.

I mean, didn't you read my post above where I mentioned how disgusted I was that Nojheim was written off as having goodly blood in him? How in the hells would good orcs being the result of a genetic mutation be any better?

You say that orcs never had the choice of being good, but that there is the problem. Them not having a choice is what destroys them as characters and makes them uninteresting.

And trying to use "established lore" to prove that goodly orcs (or non-evil ones) cannot exist is a pretty hollow argument given that we do not have a detailed history of orcs and we have an example of orcs and dwarves living together in a city.

Sir Markham pointed out, drinking another brandy. "A chap who can point at you and say 'die' has the distinct advantage".

Edited by - Tanthalas on 22 Oct 2014 01:11:19
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BEAST
Master of Realmslore

USA
1714 Posts

Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  02:04:08  Show Profile  Visit BEAST's Homepage Send BEAST a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Irennan

Human-like intelligence implies choice. Not obligatory the choice of good, but the possibility of it, and the -even greater- possibility for beings to choose to not act like crazed berserkers and -for example- mind their own business.

What is the source for the notion that orcs have human-like intelligence, though?

That they can consider different options and make decisions demonstrates a rudimentary form of intelligence. But then, even the lowest lifeforms can do that.

So what makes you think their intelligence approaches that of humans? And how closely does it approach it?

All of the lorebooks I've read on pure orcs says that they are berserkers and pillagers. If they have the ability to suppress those behaviors, I would guess that it is a form of deception, for the sake of short-term survival. Or maybe they're just luring their prey in by playing coy.

quote:
The reason for the evilness of greenskins is magic (their souls were created with ''the evulz'' inside them by Gruumsh, or this is what the PHB has on it), not the brain, tho -AFAIK, that is-.

How do we know that that magical cause did not manifest itself/result in deformed brains? The magical curse against the drow manifested itself with obsidian skin, after all.

Consider the 3.5E Monster Manual, which said about orcs:
quote:
This creature looks like a primitive human with gray skin and coarse hair. It has a stooped posture, low forehead, and a piglike face[...].(bold added; p.203)

The forehead aspect of their brains is shrunken, so that their skulls are actually smaller in that area. I've got to believe that this contributes to their historical, well-established compromised ability to show moral restraint.

<Here's> some more info on the ventro-medial prefrontal cortex of the brain, which is the lower front region, which appears to be the region responsible for regulation of anger, tolerance of frustration, empathy, etc. Damage to underdevelopment of this region of the brain has been associated with psychopathy.

quote:
Also you are assuming that their brain has the same configuration the human one (which in itself is a topic still subject to various experiments and speculations AFAIK).

Well, yeah, orcs appear to be piglike, mammalian humanoids, and mammalian humanoids all appear to have very similarly layed-out brain structures. The relative proportions of the various regions of their brains vary quite a bit, but the basic organizational scheme of their brains is remarkably similar. So it seems like a very reasonable assumption to think that their brains have similar configurations to those of humans.

If you can assume that they have human-like intelligence, then why can't I assume that they have human-like brain structures? I mean, at least I'm basing my assumption on the descriptions from their books of their bodies and faces, as well as the long history of their behavior.

While of course the exact, ultimate scheme of the human brain has yet to be completely understood, you'd be surprised how well brain scientists and surgeons have been able to map out which precise regions of the brain control which body and thought processes. They can apply electrodes to minute areas of the brain and predictably turn the associated thoughts or behaviors on and off, and actually must do this during some brain surgery procedures. They've got the human brain mapped out at least well enough to do brain surgery with a consdirable level of predictability and reliability. No, it's not absolute or 100%, but it's remarkable.

quote:
The main point however is that a being who can reason but cannot choose is the same as a robot with a very articulated program. It's just uninteresting, it exists as cannon fodder for the heroes to slay.

I get that.

But I think it's interesting that orcs appear to blur the line somewhat, appearing to be animal monsters with some, unquantified, and perhaps unquantifiable, proximity to human intelligence or moral identity. The latter aspects of the orc species is not completely negligible or deserving to be ignored. But it is so mysterious, and appears to be so remote from what we consider human, as to strain analogies or comparisons to humankind.

quote:
For a little time it seemed that the orcs were being steered away from being merely that, and I -personally- took it as an improvement. Now that they're back to the beginning, I think that it is an arbitrary removal of something that made them more interesting, while still retaining their nature of mostly aggressive and barbaric villains.

I recall all the talk of RAS supposedly introducing us to goodly orcs, or farmer orcs, or whatever.

But I don't know that I ever actually observed him doing so.

What I saw was an orc horde slowing down over the winter to take a breather, and then the goodly forces of the North extending an olive branch out to them in appeasement, and the orcs of this particular horde choosing to accept it.

And that acceptance of an act of appeasement has been interpreted by many (both in RL and in world) as a sign that the orcs were turned goodly.

But with the ability of evil souls to feign goodliness, and with the ability of predatory creatures to feign disinterest or to assume a nonthreatening posture before striking, I hardly interpreted the lull in orc attrocities as a sign of a fundamental change in their nature. I interpreted it as one particularly intelligence, charismatic orc convincing the rest of his orcs to play nice in order for them to build their strength and prepare for future continued attrocities. It was a wise tactic, but hardly a sign of morality or alignment chance.

(I don't know how much of this was ever made known to common Realmsian citizens, but Obould ultimately became exarch of Gruumsh, who continued to be classified as a chaotic or lawful evil god. That the orcs followed Obould, and that he served an evil god, would certainly seem to dispel the notion that any of them had turned goodly. And for Obould to not only be favored, but outright Chosen and ascended as an exarch would seem to identify him as a singularly evil orc. Therefore, his whole campaign, as well as his decision to abate orc attrocities for a time, ought to be seen within this context. I don't know how else to maintain continuity and consistency within the lore.)

quote:
The thing is that -as far as I can tell- fantasy has evolved beyond black/white stuff into something more nuanced and ''realistic'' (in the sense that it aids suspension of disbelief and immersion). We're not in the 1980s anymore.

No, but we were in the '80s at some point, as well as in the '90s, and on into the 2000s. And the orcs have been consistently described as evil monsters throughout that time. The '80s were hardly some distant, alien time period, as far as this discussion goes.

quote:
Also WotC tried to do something different with the orcs of Many Arrows before -and IMO it was one of the few changes that actually added something to the Realms while not feeling alien to them, instead of removing stuff- only to backpedal on it.

I don't know that they backpedalled on anything, though.

I think they merely showed that the orcs' tactic of going along with their all-too-willing-to-appease goodly neighbors successfully tricked you, just like it did their neighbors.

You only thought that they were becoming less evil. You let your desire to believe that a significant change was taking place within orc kind lead to conclude that it was actually taking place, and it has bitten you in the backside.

I say that in a tone as if I knew it, all along. But I didn't.

All I knew is that the general sentiment of goodly orcs never felt right to me. Something just felt untrue and false about it. I had cognitive dissonance about the whole matter.

And then I rejected the general notion of goodly orcs. I decided that it must've all been a ruse.

quote:
The orcs -however- have been in peace with the North since 1372 DR, up to early 1400s (for like 40 years), till the situation changed and for whatever reasons (Idk them, I'd like to hear them, if they are reported anywhere) the hostilities started again. This implies that they can indeed choose to not be random savages and that there is some incongruence among orc-lore from various eras on this matter.

Hitler lived in peace with his neighbors, too, didn't he...right up until he decided to attack them.

That the orcs were persuaded by a particularly charismatic king to hold off for a time hardly shows that they were becoming less evil. Yes, they attenuated their attrocities for awhile. But that did not show us what was in their hearts, though. It only showed us their outward behaviors. Methinks Obould's ascendancy does show us what was in their hearts, though. Their greatest leader remained evil, thoughout it all. Therefore, orc peace was still an evil peace. It was a case of halting their outward attrocities, but they still held malice in their hearts. They were only biding their time.

quote:
That argument can easily go through a slippery slope, and can be applied to humans themselves.

Right. But how exactly is that a problem?

As an irreligious man of science, I tend to think that protohumans were probably an awful lot like fantasy orcs, appearing both humanoid and like animals. They were probably very strongly guided by instinctive drives, which lead them to do things we would ordinarily consider evil. But over time, some mutant protohumans benefitted from bigger, more developed brains, and they passed these gifts onto their offspring and succeeding generations, until the species as a whole transformed or evolved.

I still wouldn't want to run into a Austalopithecan or Neanderthal man, though. They would probably just as soon gut me as grunt at me!

quote:
Also, if things were actually that way, you could say that 'evil' people are not evil, they didn't choose, they were simply born that way. They are ''victims'' of their nature in a way, which makes them even hard to hate, from a certain standpoint.

Right, and this is why we have the insanity defence for some crimes. It is argued that some people cannot reasonably be held responsible for their harmful acts because something was physically or chemically wrong with their brains at the time of the wrongdoing. Our society recognizes this as a legitimate argument.

But even if we accept the argument, and refrain from hating such insane wrongdoers, that doesn't mean that we should just let them go free within society, though. We should still take definitive steps to safeguard ourselves from them, and to confine them away from the rest of us. They might not be responsible for their actions because something is broken in their heads. But they're still broken, and they could easily do wrong again and again.

Even if we were to stop considering orcs "Evil", and to begin to consider them unresponsible for their harmful actions, Realmsian societies should still very much continue to safeguard themselves from orcs and their harmful acts. And those societies should not for one second fool themselves into thinking that those harmful acts are coming to an end just because orc attrocities have trended downward for a time.

"'You don't know my history,' he said dryly."
--Drizzt Do'Urden (The Pirate King, Part 1: Chapter 2)

<"Comprehensive Chronology of R.A. Salvatore Forgotten Realms Works">
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BEAST
Master of Realmslore

USA
1714 Posts

Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  02:27:49  Show Profile  Visit BEAST's Homepage Send BEAST a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Tanthalas

I mean, didn't you read my post above where I mentioned how disgusted I was that Nojheim was written off as having goodly blood in him? How in the hells would good orcs being the result of a genetic mutation be any better?

At least it explains both the majority of orckin appearing to be evil as well as the apparent exceptions.

quote:
You say that orcs never had the choice of being good, but that there is the problem. Them not having a choice is what destroys them as characters and makes them uninteresting.

At the very least, it transforms them from hateworthy evil monsters to tragic victims. And it warrants a change in our hearts from hatred to sympathy.

Our hatred should be reserved for their god(s), who made them this way, and set both orckin and their neighbors up for all these millenia of violence and suffering.

quote:
And trying to use "established lore" to prove that goodly orcs (or non-evil ones) cannot exist is a pretty hollow argument given that we do not have a detailed history of orcs[...]

But we do have quite a bit of history. And our understanding of a subject needs to be based on the evidence that we do have.

We can never hope to understand a subject if we forever ignore the evidence that we already have, in hopes of the discovery of some other evidence that points in a different direction.

It's best to reach a tentative conclusion based on the evidence already in hand, while reserving the right to change our minds if the body of evidence ever changes in the future.

quote:
and we have an example of orcs and dwarves living together in a city.

The thing with Baffenburg is that we don't know how long they lived together, what was in the hearts of the orcs who lived there, and what drove them apart in the end.

For all we know, the orcs were desperate for survival from some natural disturbance, so they played nice with the dwarves in order to make it through the tough times, but then turned on them when they got the chance.

There have been wild animals which have been taken in by humans and which appeared to be peaceful and domesticated for a time...until their turned on their human masters/handlers and went on a rampage. The humans thought that they had nurtured and/or trained the wildness out of the animals, but they were woefully wrong.

Therefore, the fact that dwarves and orcs did live together for a time is nonprobative about the nature of orcs. It's interesting trivia, but it doesn't really prove much.

At any rate, the notion that some orcs might've turned good centuries or millenia ago hardly sheds any light upon or dispels the guilt of the orc thugs who invaded Clan Battlehammer's territory and killed untold thousands of people, dwarves, and elves. Baffenburg and Many-Arrows are apples and oranges.

"'You don't know my history,' he said dryly."
--Drizzt Do'Urden (The Pirate King, Part 1: Chapter 2)

<"Comprehensive Chronology of R.A. Salvatore Forgotten Realms Works">
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Irennan
Great Reader

Italy
3802 Posts

Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  02:53:49  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
About the brain physiology topic, even if you are basing your assumption on appaearence, you are still assuming that orcs function like humans on a phisiological level, and when even laws of physics no longer hold true in FR, that argument goes out of the window too.

To counter your example, as hashmashadoo pointed out, Ondonti -a race that is very closely related to orcs and look like them- are peaceful people.

About magic/body, D&D firmly distinguishes between souls and bodies and it attributes evilness to the former rather than the latter. Magic leaves room for people to use their will, oppose it and choose, physiology doesn't.



About the orcs of Many Arrows choosing a different course of actions (and you keep saying ''goodly'' but it's not necessary that, minding their own business can work as well and can make them eligible to not be deserving of being slaughtered on sight, or of being described as completely incapable of choice as Mielikki did), yeah we can say that it was ''hope'' and ''impressions'' on our side in hindsight, but WotC definitely wanted to introduce a different take on orcs with that (and again, not necessarily ''good'') and then they backpedaled on it.

Also, even if you say that it was only our ''hope'', in canon Many Arrows has been in relative peace with the North for like 40 years or so, which covers a lot of orcish lifespan and is a very long time for them. If the orcs were as you say, especially considering their aggressive nature (which -on a side note- is hardly deniable, but is different from having no choice), they would have likely seen old Obould as a weakling and gathered to dethrone him. After all, who among them would be able to spend their whole life doing something that goes against their nature (assuming that no possibility of choice is actually their nature)? You don't ''bide your time'' for your whole lifespan.

Besides, you keep saying that it was all people hoping and assuming, but when there is some previous lore showing that orcs are capable of living without constantly raiding/pillaging everything for an entire lifespan, well then there's no assuming there. There are also the Ondonti to prove this (you will probably say that they are not technically orcs, but they are closely related to them, so you can't expect them to be different to the point where the former worship Eldath and the latter don't even have the faculty of choice).

Furthermore, Cattie-Brie casually handawaving that gobling as a case of ''goodly'' blood doesn't make it true. It's just the assumption of a woman.

Now 5e canon has orcs unable to choose, and I'm not trying to argue that, I'm saying that it was a kind of heel turn from their original approach to Many Arrows.

At the end, you like orcs as purely evil, others as people with choice, albeit very hard to embrace. We'll just have to agree to disagree there, since there's no arguing over preferences.



About the ''slippery slope'' argument that I presented, I am irreligious too, but -personally- I don't assume that we know how this kind of stuff work, because we don't.

I actually meant that if you attribute ''goodness'' or ''evilness'' to genes, then you have a situation where any being, even the most advanced ones (not only the ''primitive'' ones, or those affected by illnesses) cannot choose.

If we apply the approach of physics to this matter, we start as asystem definited by what we are (genes) and given initial conditions, the system then receives input from the environment, and it gives ONE possible output for a given input, thus completely throwing choice out of the window and introducing a fixed evolution with time.

Having goodly or evil behaviour to be dependant on genes, implies that no one is actually good or evil, because no one can choose. Sure, this doesn't change the stance that people hold vs ''evil'' (i.e. dangerous) behaviour, but to imply that both evil and good are not a product of personal choice and growth is rather lame IMO.

Now, you can be fine with this and not see it as a problem, but quite honestly I think that it would suck a lot. Again, we'll likely have to agree to disagree.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 23 Oct 2014 06:52:01
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xaeyruudh
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  03:22:21  Show Profile  Visit xaeyruudh's Homepage Send xaeyruudh a Private Message
I don't know whose idea they were originally, but the "farmer orcs" are probably the ondonti, who were described in the Ruins of Zhentil Keep box (I think) and the Bestiary of the Realms by Mssrs Boyd and Costa. They were LG (NG in the FR Wiki), revered Eldath, and had Int scores of 8-10 so let's say 9. Not far at all from human intelligence. On the other hand, the 3.5 MM gives orcs an Int of 8, and the 5e MM says 7... so apparently they're getting dumber over time, which I blame on designers deciding that orcs must be dumb and then picking an Int score that sounds dumb. Their Wis is 7 in 3.5, which isn't particularly "cunning" either.

This idea that orcs were created inherently evil, and don't have the ability to be otherwise, is an effort to reduce the richness of every campaign that features orcs. And since it's unreasonable to assume that this is aimed specifically at orcs, it becomes an effort to remove variety from all "monsters." Someone with the power to enforce their ideas on everyone else thinks monsters should be monsters and adventurers should kill them without asking so many questions. The problem with that effort is that drow belong to Lolth, just as much as orcs belong to Gruumsh. If we accept this premise, while holding onto the idea that gods can predetermine the moral/ethical inclination of every individual member of a particular race, then the non-evil of Drizzt and other individuals establishes that orcs are not inherently evil. They are of course products of their environment, just like drow, but like drow there must logically be room for exceptions to occur.

I'm just "runnin my mouth" at this point so Ima shut it.

Edit: my bad, didn't see the earlier mention of ondonti.

Edited by - xaeyruudh on 23 Oct 2014 03:23:20
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Irennan
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  03:31:19  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by xaeyruudh

I don't know whose idea they were originally, but the "farmer orcs" are probably the ondonti, who were described in the Ruins of Zhentil Keep box (I think) and the Bestiary of the Realms by Mssrs Boyd and Costa. They were LG (NG in the FR Wiki), revered Eldath, and had Int scores of 8-10 so let's say 9. Not far at all from human intelligence. On the other hand, the 3.5 MM gives orcs an Int of 8, and the 5e MM says 7... so apparently they're getting dumber over time, which I blame on designers deciding that orcs must be dumb and then picking an Int score that sounds dumb. Their Wis is 7 in 3.5, which isn't particularly "cunning" either.

This idea that orcs were created inherently evil, and don't have the ability to be otherwise, is an effort to reduce the richness of every campaign that features orcs. And since it's unreasonable to assume that this is aimed specifically at orcs, it becomes an effort to remove variety from all "monsters." Someone with the power to enforce their ideas on everyone else thinks monsters should be monsters and adventurers should kill them without asking so many questions. The problem with that effort is that drow belong to Lolth, just as much as orcs belong to Gruumsh. If we accept this premise, while holding onto the idea that gods can predetermine the moral/ethical inclination of every individual member of a particular race, then the non-evil of Drizzt and other individuals establishes that orcs are not inherently evil. They are of course products of their environment, just like drow, but like drow there must logically be room for exceptions to occur.

I'm just "runnin my mouth" at this point so Ima shut it.

Edit: my bad, didn't see the earlier mention of ondonti.



The problem is that now the PHB explicitly states that orcs have been created to not have choice. Drow have technically been created (and then physically cursed) by Corellon, and therefore they have free will. This is the reasoning behind ''only evil orcs''. But yeah, attributing behaviours mainly to a mix of context and choice makes for far more interesting characters than the ''innately X'' approach. It also allows entire (albeit generally very small) factions to arise, internal struggle to spark (I mean, the only reason I got interested in drow are Eilistraee and Vhaeraun, because they bring exactly this to their race).

Sadly, this is what they established as 5e canon for orcs and in the published setting it will stay that way.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 23 Oct 2014 03:33:49
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xaeyruudh
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  03:45:39  Show Profile  Visit xaeyruudh's Homepage Send xaeyruudh a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Irennan

Having goodly or evil behaviour to be dependant on genes, implies that no one is actually good or evil, because no one can choose.


Being of the Chaotic-Cynic alignment, I'll just observe that this might have been the 4e team's rationale for oversimplifying alignments... a step on the road to eliminating them altogether.

Whatever it was, I'm glad it didn't work.
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Aldrick
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  06:08:14  Show Profile Send Aldrick a Private Message
This is such a silly argument. The entire reason ANY monster is painted universally evil is so players and novel characters can kill them without asking any complicated moral questions. Period.

The reason that this is hilariously funny is because if orcs are born evil, and it is therefore legitimate to kill them for this evilness, then it opens up a whole can of worms that is never touched. When was the last time you read an adventure or read a novel in which an orc camp in which combat was about to take place, was filled with non-combatants? That is what a real orc camp would look like, it would be filled with those who support the warriors and raiders--women, children, and those who perform various crafts that support the tribe.

Not shockingly, in most cases you are going to find the orc camp populated ONLY by adult male warriors who are prepared to fight to the death. No non-combatants, women, or children in site. However, if the camps were painted realistically, it would lead to some interesting results. Namely, if a character like Drizzt shows up at the camp, the good aligned act would be not only to kill the evil aligned warriors, but also the women, the children, and the non-combatants. They would all be innately evil. So, in a D&D world in which things make logical sense, Drizzt would be cutting off the heads of orc babies. No complicated moral questions there.

I fully support this move.
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Irennan
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  06:46:37  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Aldrick

The entire reason ANY monster is painted universally evil is so players and novel characters can kill them without asking any complicated moral questions. Period.





You don't say...

quote:
This is such a silly argument.


I think people can guess the purpose of this move on WotC's side, what is being discussed here is whether or not there are instances of previous lore that can point to orcs being able to choose a lifestyle different from ''hurr, me smash''. And yes, there are a few of them (mentioned above).
Also the implications of attributing good/evil to genes were being discussed (especially the influence that it would have on the depth of the setting).
I don't see where the silliness of this lies (the discussion has gone way off topic at this point, but why silly?)

quote:
the good aligned act would be not only to kill the evil aligned warriors, but also the women, the children, and the non-combatants. They would all be innately evil. So, in a D&D world in which things make logical sense, Drizzt would be cutting off the heads of orc babies. No complicated moral questions there.


I wouldn't say so. There are complicated moral questions anyway, because we -the readers/players/DMs/whatever- from a ''metagame'' PoV know that canon says that orc are like that, characters would only know unreliable info (yes, even if given by Mielikki, who -like all FR gods- can make mistakes, and it has been shown to in-setting people multiple times. And even if it wasn't the case, the character would have to give up his/her own personal thinking and accept that notion as 100% truth, or in cases like goodly drow, it could conflict with their personal experience and cause them to wrestle with the idea), or even nothing at all beyond their experience. So, the ''good'' aligned act, from the character's perspective, wouldn't be to massacre everyone, rather to let non-combatants live...


Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 23 Oct 2014 07:08:23
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Aldrick
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  13:49:18  Show Profile Send Aldrick a Private Message
Irennan -

Sorry, I posted late at night before I went to bed, and I was not very clear. Let me try again.

First, let me be clear that there are lots of examples in FR where Orcs interact peacefully with other races, humans in particular. There are even situations where Orcs are integrated into society, and a good example of this is Thesk. The Zhents also had some integration efforts with Orcs in their military (which is how they got to Thesk in the first place in large numbers if I recall), and I would not be shocked to learn that Thay also has Orcs integrated into their society to some degree as well. Of course, being integrated into society does not necessarily mean being treated as equal citizens, but the point is that Orcs can co-exist peacefully with humans outside of the "hurr, me smash", and pillage, pillage, pillage box that they are usually placed into. It is rare because of racial discrimination and cultural differences on both sides.

Second, I meant it was silly to discuss motivations for orcs being innately evil in a setting context. The reason for orcs being made innately evil is for metagame reasons, and has nothing to do with the setting. They are being pushed into the irredeemable, innately evil box so that they can be killed without raising any difficult moral questions.

I was making fun and light of this fact, by pointing out that they have actually made it worse. If orcs are innately evil, then there is nothing that undermines a case for outright genocide. This leads to either two situations for a character such as Drizzt. Either he ends up holding the idiot ball, or he will find himself in a Genocide Dilemma / It Would Be Rude to Say Genocide moment.

In a realistic encounter with Orcs that is not a roaming band of warriors, Drizzt is going to encounter lots of non-combatants. Even Orcs need people to help prepare food, make their weapons and armor, etc. They need women for reproduction, and reproduction leads to children--this is where future orcs come from. So when Drizzt encounters these non-combatants he is forced to make a choice: to kill or not to kill. Well, if they are innately evil, the right and correct thing to do is kill them. Always. They are no different than devils and demons. It is innately a good aligned act to kill them.

Drizzt in a "Genocide Dilemma / It Would Be Rude to Say Genocide" mode: Because Drizzt knows orcs are innately evil, he starts to massacre the orc non-combatants. This ends with him hacking off the heads of orc babies, and engaging in obvious acts of genocide. Most readers are not going to see that as a good aligned act, despite the fact that if orcs are indeed innately evil, that is precisely what he should be doing--and he earns good aligned brownie points for doing it, too.

Drizzt in "Idiot Ball" mode: Because readers largely want Drizzt to appear to be a good guy he decides that he cannot hack off the heads of orc babies. Well, that is a stupid decision on his part, because in setting orcs are forever doomed to grow up to be monsters that prey upon the innocent. This is how they are, innately by their nature, and by not killing them he is putting innocent people at risk. Total genocide is the only solution to the problem. It almost arguably becomes an evil act to leave them alive--would Drizzt walk away and let some minor demon spawn roam the countryside? Hell no! However, that is what orcs are equivalent to if they are innately evil.

So, rather than avoiding the difficult moral question of whether killing a sentient species is justifiable or not, and whether or not they can be safely integrated and normalized into society to some degree--we get to talk about whether or not genocide is an acceptable solution to the problem. We have just jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire if we were trying to avoid difficult moral issues.

However, all of this will be avoided by dumbing down the setting. This means that Drizzt will never have to face that difficult question, because he will never truly encounter a non-combatant orc. Virtually every orc he encounters will be an adult male who at least has the capability of violence in the eyes of the reader. If Drizzt attacks an orc camp he will never find women, children, or the other orcs that make orc society function there. He will only find dangerous warriors who are prepared to fight to the death.

Of course, off screen we know that those other non-combatant orcs exist. So as Drizzt kills the warriors, what are his friends doing to them? If the Kingdom of Many-Arrows is attacked, it becomes very hard to avoid the difficult question of genocide--are we really prepared to have a nation of all men who all happen to be battle ready warriors? Rather than dealing with the problem directly, we will just have a situation where if the audience thinks about the implications we get situations of Fridge Horror.

Even if the protagonist heroes never engage in genocide themselves, their allies and friends surely must be doing it off screen--even if it is never mentioned.

This is why I sarcastically said that I support the move--mostly because my dark sense of humor would love to see fan reaction to Drizzt hacking up orc babies.
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Irennan
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  14:06:47  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
Damn, didn't detect sarcasm

I see your point now, and pretty much agree with you. The only observation I have is what I've already said about the characters not being able to know such an absolute truth, or having personal experiences or beliefs that may lead them to wrestle with the idea of ''unredeemable'' evilness. In this case moral difficulty still arises for them, until -as you said- the orcs are depicted as 100% ferocious warriors ready to fight to the death, and the slaughtering of non-combatants conveniently happens off-screen.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 23 Oct 2014 14:12:37
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Bladewind
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  14:21:41  Show Profile Send Bladewind a Private Message
On the single camp scale, aye, I can see some orcs turning to a less aggressive life locally. But outside of their immediate reach they probably see hunting territory, and as organised hunts bring in bigger game, they sent bigger and bigger hunting teams to roam further. Adventurers have been encountering such far ranging hunting parties for ages. Chancing on an orc camp is unlikely as the thoughness of an orcish hunting party (that isn't slowed down by elderly, pregnant women or children) allows them to travel alot further.

On the multiplanar scale Orcs have been known to murder whole worlds. Just in realmspace alone there are several elven worlds that have had their population efficiently murdered by order of the high council of military advisors of the Scro from their homeworld Dukagsh.

Orcs in my Realmspace also find sentient flesh tasty, and tend to have a complex mysticism around eating choice parts of their enemies (or even friends). Having a taste for battle and flesh is a severe problem for their self control in stressfull situations. This causes them to commit gruesome acts during in wartimes, or lash out at their frustations out of seamingly nowhere. This is then also exaggerated by their oral traditions, which spur them on to outdo the legendary 'heroes' in their rise to power and conquest stories.

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Aldrick
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  15:30:12  Show Profile Send Aldrick a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Bladewind

On the single camp scale, aye, I can see some orcs turning to a less aggressive life locally. But outside of their immediate reach they probably see hunting territory, and as organised hunts bring in bigger game, they sent bigger and bigger hunting teams to roam further. Adventurers have been encountering such far ranging hunting parties for ages. Chancing on an orc camp is unlikely as the thoughness of an orcish hunting party (that isn't slowed down by elderly, pregnant women or children) allows them to travel alot further.


Okay, so you encounter a raiding party of a sentient race that are innately evil, and will kill you without hesitation. No moral dilemma there, it is self-defense. Now that you have killed them, you are not going to wonder where they came from? You are just going to sit back, let them continue to breed and build a massive horde to raid and pillage all they can before they are defeated? Or, alternatively, are you going to hunt down where these beings came from and deal with the source of the problem?

If you decide to ignore the threat, and not pursue the source of the problem you find yourself holding the idiot ball. You are just setting yourself up for endless conflict, and ensuring that others continue to suffer. After all, there is no hope of a true peace--they are innately evil and will never change.

If you decide to pursue the source of the problem, then that brings you face-to-face with the moral dilemma. Will you or will you not engage in an act of genocide to end the threat? If you refuse, then you are once again holding the idiot ball. If you decide to do it, you could potentially be jumping off the moral event horizon in the eyes of the audience (even though in setting you would be getting brownie points for putting spikes through orc baby skulls).

If you decide to try and avoid it, and just let your allies do it off screen then we have a situation of fridge horror. Sure, as the hero you did not get your hands dirty. You just let your allies slaughter all the women and the children and chose to pretend it was not happening.
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Bladewind
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  16:50:45  Show Profile Send Bladewind a Private Message
Yep, the horrible parts tend to happen off screen. But the typical citystate or village in the Realms doesn't have the means to see through with sending half of their military on campaigns into dark caverns and inhospitable crags to track down nomadic orc camps.

A state ruler in the Realms usually wont hesitate to send operations that eradicate external sentient evil threats. Its just part of their reality that certain resources they have at their disposal are tied to protecting their people from pillaging, enslaving and murdering humanoids (be they orc, gnoll, goblin or human). Throw in language barriers, competing faiths, rival demihuman states and one can see genocides are often the only immediate responce a ruler has.

In the Year of the Lost Lady (1241 DR), a Tethyrian Noble woman was caught by a minor horde and slain. The noble houses of Tethyr took great care to memorize her, by commiting whole sale genocidal slaughters throughout the whole of southern Tethyr during the rest of the summer.


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xaeyruudh
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  17:59:24  Show Profile  Visit xaeyruudh's Homepage Send xaeyruudh a Private Message
I think we're always going to have at least two camps of DMs and players: those who play to get away from the complications of the real world, and those who demand that their fantasy settings be believable. The first group is best served by hack and slash, with minimal thought... that's not calling anybody stupid; it's just observing that when you sit down to kill some orcs you wanna kill some orcs; you don't want to sit around debating whether or not they deserve it. They're orcs, end of discussion. The second group is put off by hack and slash... their goal is to make the fantasy as close as possible to reality, with the exception of magic, because that's what makes the setting most believable. Believability isn't even a priority for the first group. The second group would reply that if all that matters is killing things, there are lots of video games that offer that without having to roll dice or even coordinate schedules with other players... just log on and kill things, by yourself, or with others from all over the world, for as long as you like.

D&D can accommodate both styles, and I'll venture to guess that this flexibility is part of the reason D&D has survived this long while many other games & companies have disappeared. It's an epic fail to limit a D&D setting to one or the other, since that would be alienating some percentage of the customer base in either case.

I think what I'm getting at is why are we arguing about this? In the impossible event of one side winning and getting to change the way everyone looks at any/all aspects of the Realms, the setting would become weaker as a result. Regardless of what WotC intends, we should always be looking for ways to make the Realms more inclusive of varying styles and goals-of-playing. And no matter how hard we disagree with each other, we should remember that every player who is enthusiastic about the Realms brings creativity to the table... even those who are here just to kill everything that moves and pillage everything that doesn't.

Edited by - xaeyruudh on 23 Oct 2014 18:02:12
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Derulbaskul
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  18:35:19  Show Profile Send Derulbaskul a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by LordofBones

Pretty much this.

Statswise, Errtu would have splattered Drizzt all over northern Faerun.



Not really. Type VI demons were weak as piss in 1E. They only had 8+8 hit dice given them an average of 44 hit points. So even without the vulnerability to cold given to Errtu as a narrative device, he really wasn't that much of a threat.

Cheers
D

NB: Please remember: A cannon is a big gun. Canon is what we discuss here.
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Tanthalas
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Posted - 23 Oct 2014 :  19:24:24  Show Profile Send Tanthalas a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by BEAST
At least it explains both the majority of orckin appearing to be evil as well as the apparent exceptions.



A horrible and pretty insulting explanation like that does not satisfy me. It's te kind of stuff that I imagine goes on in klan meetings.

quote:
Originally posted by BEAST
But we do have quite a bit of history. And our understanding of a subject needs to be based on the evidence that we do have.


And yet we have evidence of Orcs living in peace with Dwarves, but you choose to ignore it. We don't know much about Baffenburg, but we also don't know much of anything about Orc history.

New lore can appear whenever WotC or the authors/designers of the Realms choose to. They were taking Many-Arrows in a very interesting direction but then decided to dumb them back down to uninteresting fodder. Bring back Obould because Hartusk is complete dung.

Sir Markham pointed out, drinking another brandy. "A chap who can point at you and say 'die' has the distinct advantage".
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Xal Valzar
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Posted - 24 Oct 2014 :  01:26:19  Show Profile Send Xal Valzar a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Tanthalas

I always assumed that Drizzt was simply too stupid to cast spells. Maybe no one ever told him that he needs to pray for them.

Regardless, while I think having official stats for well known characters is fun, I don't see a need for authors to strictly adhere to the game rules (and they usually don't anyway).



no Drizzt is not stupid, it is said that he learned magic well in the first half of his last year in Sococre in Mozzenberzan. Also it said that he might have been a great wizard if so he choose.

Knowledge is Power
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Xal Valzar
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Posted - 24 Oct 2014 :  01:38:03  Show Profile Send Xal Valzar a Private Message
Writers and players need to 'man up' and face the truth that some people need a killing because of thier actions. Thats it.

Orcs, and any sentient creature, is not born one way or the other. If so it is not thinking but acting by instinct. There is no evidence to suggest that Orcs act in ways that are made by instinct. Some Orcs, and indeed many, deserve to die because they have choosen to live by taking from and killing other people. If anyone feels bad for killing an orc that was about to kill or steal from him he does not deserve to live.
If some women or even non-agresive people die that completly fine. supporting evil is as bad as being the one fighting on the field. Any children that die would be on the fualt of the agressor.

people should stop having a weak soul (pusillanimous in Latin, or p-u-s-s -y in its english adaptation(didnt know that fact did u?)) and face up that some people need a killing for their actions and that if other poeple, even babies, need to die because of that then its not thier problem. they did not sign up to be raided and its the agressors fualt for starting the fight.
its the moral idea of altruims that makes others ones responsibilty even when it is potentaily hurtful to ones self. an idea that leads to your death and to seeing your life 2nd place. an idea that is supposed to make u impotent to act and defend your life, one fitting for a slave.

if u want a concrete example look at The Allies vs Nazi Germany in WW2. Or my homeland of Israel today.
The 'cozy' feeling of mercy for your enemies will get my family and loved ones killed both in the past and in the present and future.

Knowledge is Power

Edited by - Xal Valzar on 24 Oct 2014 01:43:36
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Irennan
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Posted - 24 Oct 2014 :  02:31:34  Show Profile Send Irennan a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Xal Valzar

Writers and players need to 'man up' and face the truth that some people need a killing because of thier actions. Thats it.

Orcs, and any sentient creature, is not born one way or the other. If so it is not thinking but acting by instinct. There is no evidence to suggest that Orcs act in ways that are made by instinct. Some Orcs, and indeed many, deserve to die because they have choosen to live by taking from and killing other people. If anyone feels bad for killing an orc that was about to kill or steal from him he does not deserve to live.
If some women or even non-agresive people die that completly fine. supporting evil is as bad as being the one fighting on the field.


You are ignoring the context in which orcs women/non combatants get to grow and live in. To them, this is their life, it is very hard to see an alternative, because -even if they wanted/were able to make the moral choice of ''good''- they would hardly be able to make a physical choice. That's because if some orc ''workers'' started choosing to walk away from their tribes, then the fighters would most likely capture, imprison, harm or even kill them. Assuming that they managed to get away, where would they go? Other races would hunt them and kill them on sight (yeah I know that racism is bad, stupid and whatever, don't start that argument again, no one is doubting that. But even if racism is bad, it exists in the Realms and most people wouldn't even give an orc the chance to prove themselves and intergrate into their society). Not a nice perspective of life, eh? You could call them cowards/weak and so on for this, but do they deserve to be exterminated? Why wouldn't they deserve a second chance, in a different context where they could make their choice with serenity? A good character would offer civilians or even warriors who surrender or are taken prisoners at least a second shot, rather than killing everything that he deems evil.

quote:
Any children that die would be on the fualt of the agressor.


How does this even make sense? If the ''heroes'' killed a child, they would be responsible for it, not the child's people. The child cannot do anything, is not a danger and could very well choose a different life if raised differently.

quote:

people should stop having a weak soul (pusillanimous in Latin, or ***** in its english adaptation) and face up that some people need a killing for their actions and that if other poeple, even babies, need to die because of that then its not thier problem.


if u want a concrete example look at The Allies vs Nazi Germany in WW2. Or my homeland of Israel today. Where the same woozy feeling of mercy for your enemies will get my family and loved ones killed.



You call this ''manning up'', I call this losing your humanity

What do you do in your example? Kill children and whoever because they ''supported the evil'' by merely working in the fields and industries? Also, by your logic a huge part of mankind should be exterminated at this point, since populations normally ''support'' their countries by working, when they go to war, and so many countries have committed atrocious acts in their history. But really when it comes to war, when it comes to killing civilians or even a soldier who is actually a person, who has likely done nothing to you, whom you don't even know and that would likely choose to not be fighting and be with their family if they could, well then there's no ''evil'' and ''good'', rather a giant clusterf*ck. Remember that in war every side has its victims, and they usually are in the majority, i.e. the people who would rather be in peace (yes, even among the aggressors) than be involved in a pointless massacre. Wars are not fought for ''ideas'' for ''good'' or whatever, they are fought for very concrete and material interests of few people (who are very good at throwing mud on the facts, through promises, brainwashing, terror and so on) at the expense of the life of the most.



quote:
"He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder."


This is from Albert Einstein.

Idk why I posted this, since considering what you implied in the last part of your post, you are likely trolling.

Mathematics is the art of giving the same name to different things.

Edited by - Irennan on 24 Oct 2014 02:36:31
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Xal Valzar
Learned Scribe

Argentina
214 Posts

Posted - 24 Oct 2014 :  03:54:07  Show Profile Send Xal Valzar a Private Message
answer me one thing, why is it the heros problem if some orc women are there to? or some kids?
what would he gain from sparring them?

secondly if the orc choose to live his life like that then he would be better of dead to begin with. Hes the one that choose to live under evil, would he have any self esteem he would either rebel, and maybe die, then he would be an ally. however as long as he is there he has no right to his own life.
people need to live up to the consequences of their actions. it doesnt matter if they had no other choice, which they obviously do have, they pay for what choice they made. treat them as anything less and they are not humane and one would have no qualms by killing them.

the reality is hard, its not sugar coated to fit what you belive to be right and kind. some people want to hurt you, thell enjoy watching you get hurt and might make a game out of it. those people deserve to die. some people wont be so enntusiastic but they will sanction that by not doing anything. the chocie to not do anytihng is a chocie by itself. in this sense a coward does not deserve to live. life belongs to those willing to fight for it. those who dont fight for it forfeit the right to their own life.

im not saying kill a child on sight, unless that helps you defeat the enemy. if u see a child and it doesnt change anything let him go. but if u have a plan and it involves killing the child it still is the agressors fault. poor kid. though the one who intitated the attack is to blame.

the best concertizing of this is the movie the Lone Survivor.
and if there are soldiers who want to live in peace why are they taking arms? even if they do have wishes of peace, though i dont know how would one know that sicne there actiosn suggest other wise, they still choose to fight and deserve to be killed. also if most people want peace why do they not fight agianst a situation that would put them in war? the idea of the "peaceful majority" is more fitted to be called the "indiffrent majority". ad if your indiffrent to your life i see no moral problem of killing you to begin with. as i said, life belongs to those who fight for life.

if you would notice anything from history war was always wagered by one side wanting to loot from the other side and one side either wanting to loot back or wanting to retaliate. War is made by the desire to steal from people and sustain ones self by other peoples effort. war is the realm of the un-productive. in that sense that is concrete intrest but its stem is much more abstract. it means that one has no way to produce and most loot from others. a person like that does not gain power to attack a nation by good hard working people.

and that qoute is sick, its saying that the man who risks his life to safeguard America or Britain or France is as evil as the vile japanese or german warmongers. by getting the whtie and the black in the same laundry machine he has not just blackned the white but also whitned the black. extoling mindless Nazi soldiers with the British soldiers that fought them and probably saved the life of his loved ones in Switzerland. what he advocates for is to send the innocnce on the good side to safe guard the 'innocent' on the bad side. first there are no innocent on an evil side, if they were they would be an opposition and your ally. if they stand idly and support the war machine by working as factory hands or just giving them there money via taxes or even standing idle then they are just as deserving of death as the men with guns.
i dont take anything from einstien other then physics as a great source, and even with physics i have jaundice eye. also at the later part of his life Einstien retracted from his pacfist position and advocated for being offensive to Nazi Germany, knowing that Nazi Germany was going directly for him might have sobered him up.

the point is war requires you to kill not just people with weapons in their hands. if you can not do that then you are a coward and should not go adventuring to begin with. one other reason FR has declined is the lack of moral certanty and mercy to the evil that many adventurers posses. also your life is possible because of those men who were brave enough and had enough self-esteem to fufil thier plans to erdicate those who would harm them at any means.

Knowledge is Power

Edited by - Xal Valzar on 24 Oct 2014 04:01:15
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Wooly Rupert
Master of Mischief
Moderator

USA
36779 Posts

Posted - 24 Oct 2014 :  05:47:45  Show Profile Send Wooly Rupert a Private Message
quote:
Originally posted by Xal Valzar

Writers and players need to 'man up' and face the truth that some people need a killing because of thier actions. Thats it.

Orcs, and any sentient creature, is not born one way or the other. If so it is not thinking but acting by instinct. There is no evidence to suggest that Orcs act in ways that are made by instinct. Some Orcs, and indeed many, deserve to die because they have choosen to live by taking from and killing other people. If anyone feels bad for killing an orc that was about to kill or steal from him he does not deserve to live.
If some women or even non-agresive people die that completly fine. supporting evil is as bad as being the one fighting on the field. Any children that die would be on the fualt of the agressor.

people should stop having a weak soul (pusillanimous in Latin, or p-u-s-s -y in its english adaptation(didnt know that fact did u?)) and face up that some people need a killing for their actions and that if other poeple, even babies, need to die because of that then its not thier problem. they did not sign up to be raided and its the agressors fualt for starting the fight.
its the moral idea of altruims that makes others ones responsibilty even when it is potentaily hurtful to ones self. an idea that leads to your death and to seeing your life 2nd place. an idea that is supposed to make u impotent to act and defend your life, one fitting for a slave.

if u want a concrete example look at The Allies vs Nazi Germany in WW2. Or my homeland of Israel today.
The 'cozy' feeling of mercy for your enemies will get my family and loved ones killed both in the past and in the present and future.



You really need to stop bringing real world examples into every discussion. This is a Realms board, and bringing real world stuff in can cause a lot of issues.

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